Can we stop pretending that Riot's goal is balance?

Time and time again, Riot has proven themselves to care, only loosely, about their player base. Intentionally keeping champions in spotlights in order to sell skins, catering the entire game around the play styles of a few highly skilled players, refusing to listen to their community when we tell them very real issues. It seems that the Riot Games development team is a group of people with wildly conflicting views on what the game actually needs. Either that or they intentionally only give the player base enough to keep them coming back.

It was stated in a Q&A awhile ago that Riot never intends to be finished with the game, that it will always be an evolving experience. At the time, that sounded great. Include new things, make big updates, keep us hooked. What I'm starting to realize now, though, is that the players take balance much more seriously than the developers. What is for us the most important aspect of the game seems to take a low priority for Riot.

Though it took me two years of playing the game, I now realize that balance is not profitable. While Riot can pour resources and creativity into a multitude of improvements surrounding the game, everything from the actual loading screen to the nexus being taken remains an unorganized, chaotic, volatile mess.

So can we stop pretending that we're Riot's priority? Had Riot been listening to it's community for the past year, the game would not be in the state it is. League of Legends has always been a touchy game, full of strong champions and unfair advantages, but it has never been as pronounced as it is now. And Riot, as a game developer, has never seemed so deaf to it's player base and out of touch with what it's community actually wants.